


Mnemosyne

by Kusari Tsukihi (littleninjacatgirl)



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Angst, Memory Alteration, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Trauma, Shock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-04-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:01:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23933476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleninjacatgirl/pseuds/Kusari%20Tsukihi
Summary: Finally having time to herself after the final battle with Hades, Kusari confronts the trauma she's gone through over the last few days, unbeknownst to her that there is more at play beneath the surface.
Kudos: 7





	Mnemosyne

**Author's Note:**

> [Takes place in the Pendants, after returning to the Crystarium following the Final Days of Amaurot]

In the aftermath of success, one would normally expect to feel happiness or, at the very least, relief. 

Normally, of course, being the keyword. . . but since when was Kusari known for normalcy? Her entire existence was a practice in peculiarity, living outside the norm. . . 

Kusari finally had a moment to collect herself after her harrowing adventure into Emet-Selch's 'Hell'. The traumatic experiences biding their time until she was safely stowed within her apartments at the Pendants before hammering their full weight onto her the exact moment she pushed open the window.

Gazing at the beautiful night sky outside the window, the tears suddenly began to fall, unbidden, feeling foreign and obscene even in her private chambers. While before, Ardbert had been a strengthening presence and a voice of reason, now the room was silent as those twinkling stars above. 

She held her hands up to her cheeks, warm and wet from tears, and vaguely registered how her fingers trembled. She exhaled a shuddering breath in an effort to contain her emotions, her shoulders shaking with the force of it. She started suddenly, breaking her gaze from that starlit abyss above when the movement of her reflection in the windowpane caught her periphery. She did not recognize the woman who stared back at her, the haunted expression or the shock of white hair on her head was as out of place to her as the tears streaming down her face. She felt the sound building before it broke free, a keening sound that echoed in that silent room as she lost her war with emotion and began crying in earnest, wrapping her arms around herself protectively. 

The events of the last several days began to play out in her mind in booming flashes of retroactive noise as her stabilizing shock gave way to post-traumatic stress. Every waking moment had been searingly painful as she struggled to contain the light aether within her soul. Most of her experience in the Tempest had been accompanied by the disturbingly audible sound of her soul cracking and light flaring around the edges of her vision. When the pain wasn’t eating her alive, she felt disturbingly little, like the biting edge of frostbite affecting a limb before succumbing to numbness and death. 

She'd done her best to concentrate on the mission, tried desperately to ignore the effects the umbrally charged aether was having on her body. Her limbs had felt entirely too heavy to move and her lungs had ached as she constantly struggled to catch her breath. Dully, she was made aware of how slow her pulse had become, despite how painfully hard her poor heart pounded to force her congealing blood to maintain it's flow, as it echoed loudly inside her skull. Her mind at times would go completely blank like she couldn't remember where she was or why she was there. 

In that dazed and aching state, she'd somehow managed to wander off at one point, despite the urgency of the situation. Had Alisaie not been discreetly dogging her steps, ever watchful, the implications of what could have happened hung over them all. Alisaie hadn't admitted her worry aloud, but written over her face was the same sorrow that she reserved for the afflicted back at the Inn when she felt no one was looking. Considering that she found Kusari standing stock still and staring into some middle distance the way Halric did, the concern was warranted.    
  
Alisaie had gently taken her by the hand to lead her back, her hands had felt uncomfortably hot against Kusari's chilled skin. She’d felt the hug like someone observing from outside as Alisaie attempted to warm her, so Kusari had managed to smile at her, an attempt to put her mind at ease. The smile she’d received in return had not reached Alisaie’s eyes. The younger girl had even chided her then, for not wearing something warmer, observing Kusari thusly, ‘your hands feel like ice and it appears your lips are turning blue, hopefully, we’ll be able to retreat someplace warmer soon’. What a poor joke in hindsight. 

She remembered considering for a brief moment what kind of monster she might become. . . How terrible . . . how powerful. . . how devastating. . . The umbral aether numbing her of all intense emotions, so that when she imagined the horrible scenario of possibly changing right then and there and killing Alisaie, imagined being that creature and having access to the rift and returning to the source. Hydaelyn’s light-laden champion, responsible for bringing about the Ascian’s long-awaited Ardor, the irony was bitter on her tongue . . . However, there had been no abrupt horror at her own hypothetical actions, merely a brief and muted surprise, a subconscious awareness that if allowed to reach that point, she would no longer exist to care about the deaths of those she cherished, a sobering thought. She’d lightly shaken her head to clear it of the lingering images and allowed Alisaie to drag her the rest of the way to where the rest of the group had planned to meet the Ondo.    
  
Their group was directed to the hidden city of ruins, deep in what had once been the dark depths of the Tempest. At least, that’s what they expected. What they had in fact beheld had been a beautifully crafted simulacrum of a sprawling city. The buildings illuminated by some incandescent glow that seemed to emanate from the stones themselves. Little wonder the Ondo had been frightened and awestruck by the sight. Kusari imagined how before Bismark had allowed his breath to flood the deep that the city would have glowed even brighter when submerged, the water refracting the light through waves into rainbows. 

Yet as stunningly beautiful as the city was, rising from some mysterious foundation hidden beneath dark waters, it had felt so hollow. Y’shtola’s revelation that it was indeed some powerful illusory magics formed of aether had confirmed Kusari’s instincts. Weak as their perception of the world, they could feel the enormity of the spell around them, not just in its sheer size, as the buildings towering above them, but in the attention to the most minute details toward the residents of this creation. Their group watched in awe as the shades of the Ancients wandered about as though still alive, even able to interact with them. She would come to know their truths soon, the tragedy of their lives revealed in bits and pieces as she and the scions continued deeper into the City of Amaurot. 

________

She drew herself out of the memory as she swayed on her feet and unsteadily moved to sit on the windowsill, still hugging herself, she leaned her head back to again stare at those blessed stars. After all, that's what it had all been for, hadn't it? The struggle to contain the light, to bring the darkness back to a blighted world. A world that would never be whole, merely a shard, she mentally reminded herself, letting that odd stray thought buoy her against the tide of emotions sweeping her away. 

A piece of a whole. . . incomplete. . . but wasn't that wrong? Wasn't that just terribly sad? That’s what Emet-Selch had tried to make them see. Everyone was broken and breaking and it started with the star as a whole, but it could still be fixed if only they would willingly stand aside. Couldn’t they see how existing as fragmented souls was a perversion of the natural order that should be redressed at any cost? The Ancients were the rightful caretakers of the world, they could see the balance restored, bring back those that were lost. 

A treacherous part of Kusari’s heart stung at the thought, ached to heed the words of a man whose love for his people bordered on the obsessive, and empathized with his plight to see them all restored to him. She would have proffered her hand as she had with Zenos, to end the fighting, but remembering how that had ended reminded her to stamp down on her bleeding heart. For it would do naught in the face of Emet-Selch’s convictions, there was no room for emotional weakness with the Solus men, Ascian or Garlean alike. 

Her mind reeled at the implications laid before her. However, there was still some part that held strong, rationally or irrationally, that refused to yield to her tender heart. She could not bring herself to reconcile something he had said about how much they had sacrificed to ‘save’ the star, to stop the destruction. She found herself considering the losses suffered before, during, and after that “Doom”. A mental image of The Goddess Sophia’s scales had played in her mind, weighing the worth of souls against the fate of the world, and as they tipped, overwhelmed by weight, she had steeled herself to stand against Emet-Selch’s ideals once more, to see her mission through.    
  
But oh, she had not been prepared for the final card in his hand. 

  
The Shades had explained it a bit, the Doom that had befallen their world. Emet-Selch’s initial recreation of the city formed a purgatory out of his memories where the Shades had seemed anxious but confident in the Convocation’s ability to protect them, aware yet unaware of imminent destruction drawing near. With her perception of their reality, she had still failed to grasp the gravity of their situation, thinking what could honestly pose a threat to a race of people so powerful as to create living creatures with a thought. Then he’d revealed the devastating truth to her and the Scions, to deter them from their mission. He had opened the door to the hellscape he remembered and she had been vastly underprepared to walk into that wall of flame to recover the Exarch. 

______

Yet walk she had, more like run, headlong into that inferno. The heat, the smell of burning flesh, her eyes watering from the ash, it had felt so oddly familiar. She chalked it up to the many battles that had brought her to this point in her life, she sought comfort in the comparison, but only found fear roiling in her belly like a snake. Fear spiking the adrenaline in her blood, finally giving her a sense of urgency. Fear lacing through her haze and clearing the light from her vision as it widened to reveal the terror that was the final days of Amaurot.    
  
Kusari gasped deeply, feeling the fresh air from her room in the Pendants fill her lungs. It jolted her away from the memories momentarily, grounding her in reality. She’d half expected it to scald her lungs with ash. The echo was a blessing and a curse, giving her insights into others but allowing her to vividly relive her own darkest moments as if experiencing them fresh. Becoming so painfully familiar with the Final Days of Amaurot as if she’d walked the cracked stone paths not just once, but hundreds of times, but reliving the terror always like the first. 

She remembered as if she’d just stepped inside that barrier of flame, felt the heat of it behind her pushing her onward. She stared up in horror as the world around her fell apart at it’s seams. She saw the fire raining from the sky, the charred debris and shattered stone littering the path. Her feet moved instinctively as a meteor fell in the middle of the path, to find her some cover behind the debris. Glancing up she watched the beast that summoned it disappear as the fireball hit the ground and the resulting explosion killed several 'people' nearby. She felt the searing wind blow her hair back as she ducked down again, coming face to cracked-mask-covered face with the crumpled body of an Ancient that had tried to take shelter behind the same debris as she.    
  
She had scrambled back to her feet. Looking at the pained expression of this once imposing person, it shook something deep within her that was trying to rationalize that this was just a vision. She kept moving, keeping to the edges of the road where the debris was piled highest, looking for a vantage point while avoiding the hoards of beasts rampaging around the paths and the fire raining from the heavens. All while Emet-Selch’s commentary echoed in her mind, leading her on to see the worst of it. She climbed a pile of debris and stood, warily glancing over her shoulder to see that the monsters nearby were otherwise engaged in fighting each other.

Kusari gazed out over the burning landscape, saw the massive beasts in the distance fueling the fire, the tremors echoed through the ground as their destruction toppled buildings and upheaved the land itself. She was left wondering how anyone could have survived such devastation when the din behind her crescendoed as one of the smaller beasts was ripped to pieces by the others. The sounds of shrieking and bones crunching drew her attention so suddenly she jumped. In her surprise, something caught on her foot and she slipped, landing prone on what she’d assumed was just a pile of rubble. 

Her breath caught in her throat as she beheld the several bodies tangled in the debris, most were crushed beneath the fallen stones. Her foot had become tangled in the robes of one such unfortunate soul whose broken body was eerily twisted. Sliding off the pile, Kusari quickly untangled herself and moved to the broken edge of the path to heave off into the fiery abyss below. The sight of pure white bile splattering the stones around her sobering, reminding her that time was of the essence for both her and the Exarch. 

She ran with renewed vigor, allowing the cracking of her soul to drown out the horrid shrieks of the beasts and . . . something else that echoed from deep within the earth. She had not been able to identify the sound but it had resonated deep in her bones, bringing back that strange familiar fear she couldn’t place. So she ran, outpacing her allies as she outmaneuvered a few of the beasts that spotted her. She allowed her survival instincts and Emet-Selch’s taunting voice to lead her from one nightmarish scene to another. Some were just more monsters, tearing into and devouring the bodies of the fallen, while others were more heartrending sights. Buildings collapsed as she passed, more bodies in the rubble, of people that had sought shelter in their stone towers to have them collapse around them. She found places along the fringes of the paths, where Amaurotines had huddled together in fear and been immolated together, their white masks cracked from heat yet stark against the blackened charring of their bodies.    
  
The worst was at the collapsed amphitheater, where she faced the enormous bellwether fiend. She’d attempted to look straight ahead as she entered the gaping maw that had once been the grand entrance of the building, but it was pointless. Her eyes drifted down to the ground to avoid the many bodies in her path this time, more than she’d seen in one place since stepping into this hell, positioned like they had been running away when they were brought low. She realized this building, with its spacious interior beneath a now obliterated domed-ceiling, had probably been set apart as a shelter, though it would ultimately only prove a tomb. So many people gathered in one spot, creation magics raging out of control from fear and whatever else was wrong with the world, it would only be a matter of time. The monsters would come from within, not without.    
  
She had fought the bellwether and it’s beasts successfully, but her concentration faltered at the end. She had allowed herself to gaze out at the rotunda, saw the myriad bodies scattered about the auditorium pews, and found that some of the bodies were relatively small in stature compared to the towering adults. The bellwether began to swell to accompany Emet-Selch’s narration of events but her mind was frozen on the small forms of Amaurotine children wrapped in the protective embraces of their parents. The bellwether burst and the flames devoured them all, reducing the lifeless bodies to naught but cinder and ash.    
  
She loosened her arms from around herself, her hands aching from the white-knuckled grip she’d had in her robes. Stiffly she moved to shrug out of the harness that held her staff against her back, setting the weapon across her lap, she turned her eyes from the stars to the crystal which adorned her staff. With her hands no longer fisted in the fabric of her clothes, they returned to trembling so she gripped the lacquered wooden pole instead. It’s smooth familiarity warming under her sweaty palms. It had been thanks to the strength of her healing magics that they hadn’t also succumbed to the blaze of the bellwether, the powerful Afflatus Solace spell relieved the worst of the pain as Medica knit their wounds closed in moments. If only the fire had burned away her memory or some spell could excise the visions, she would forever be haunted by the images of those small bodies consigned to flame. 

______

Kusari looked back to the sky in time to see a shooting star and trembled at the sight. In that innocuous flash of light, she was suddenly back on that precipice as the stars rained fire over a burning world. They’d fought their way to the end, through hordes of malformed monstrosities to fight the beast, Therion. Its voices rang out like a choir, as devastatingly powerful as it was hauntingly beautiful, the Doom lurking in its very shadow with every step it took closer. They fought through its deafening chorus of destruction, and a soul-deep weariness taking its toll. 

As Kusari’s mana pool had begun to run dry, she deliriously contemplated drawing upon some of the light aether in her soul to bolster her own mana. Its icy touch, similar to the cooling sensation of white magic but so much more unrefined and potent, so unyielding. Something in her mind rebelled at the thought, she knew how dangerous it would be to release that power, knew she would never be able to control it if she attempted to tap it, and it gave her pause enough to resist the temptation. At least until she’d exhausted every other avenue at her disposal and the beast still towered above them. 

She was about to attempt it when the beast let out a guttural sound and fell to the combined might of her allies, and she sighed in relief, glad to not test how corrupted light aether would affect her magic. The relief was short-lived however as a loud cracking sound reverberated in her head and she was on her knees before she realized what was happening, choking on white bile while Emet-Selch appeared before them again, goading them. As her friends fell for his baiting and then fell at his onslaught, she felt the hopelessness rising in her chest. The Light now spoke in her mind, whispering words laced in sweetest poison, ‘Stop this foolish resistance. . . there will be no more sorrow or love or pain or joy or . . . There will be nothing left. . .’ 

  
“If you had the strength. . .” Ardbert's clear voice rang in her ears, in her head, drowning out that traitorous voice, as he asked if she could take the next step and she felt her soul swell. It was the feeling of like recognizing like, his strength opening a wellspring in the frozen depths of her soul, flooding her with warmth. She’d never felt such a homecoming as this, as two pieces of the same soul uniting into one. She rose, empowered before her adversary, seeing the disbelief and recognition in Emet-Selch’s eyes. She didn’t know what he saw in her silhouette, but she was overcome with another strange sensation of nostalgia, a vague familiarity that made her chest ache as she saw him rise to take her on. . .    
  
Before she could contemplate it deeper, G’raha joined the assault. 

__________________

Perhaps as a blessing, she didn’t remember much of the final fight, and she curiously prodded at the memory. It felt different than the rest, it was already becoming hazy at the edges whereas the rest was crystal clear. She remembered how he’d shed his mortal appearance, his title, his very humanity, just to best her. She remembered the crackling swell of his dark aether on the air and could taste the power of it as he let his true name be known. It sparked familiarity in her blood that she could no longer ignore, shivering through her soul like a swan song, as she answered him in his own tongue, **_{I know your Soul. . . I remember you}_ **

He was too far gone into his rage, fully engulfed in his grief and tempering to care if she had a sliver of ancient memory now. She looked on as flashes of familiar faces and masks hung in the air around them, staring at her with hallowed eyes. They were empty, and the guilt was a weight in her stomach. There was memory here, she felt the pull of it on her mind as the echo tried to drag her under but she fought it back to stay aware while Emet-Selch’s form manifested into that of his truest self, wielding a totem formed in the shape of his god. There was a flash of light and she knew she’d made an irrevocable action against him, there was a surge of power as so much light aether was wrenched from her soul. Then nothing. 

  
Somehow, she’d won. Suddenly they were standing at the precipice of a broken landscape, the remnants of the once beautiful city visible all around them. She couldn’t recall the specifics of the fight, but something had changed within her. It was something important but the memories were turning to mist, like a song in her head but the words wouldn’t form on her tongue. She could only remember him dissolving before her, his face a mask of pain and regret as he made one final plea to her. 

"Remember. . . " Emet-Selch, no. . . his name had been Hades. . . his final words to her rumbling through her bones as his living aether had been bleeding out, “Remember us. . .” but then his voice changed to the gentle comfort of her mother's nearly forgotten voice, her last words to her echoed Hades' even as they preempted them by nigh a decade, "Remember us, Sarritsu, never forget where you came from. . . No matter where Oschon's winds guide your steps, remember because to forget where you come from is to forget yourself." 

Kusari let out another shuddering breath, her trembling quieting slightly. Her mother's last words to her, knowing they would probably never meet again, "Memories can be a burden, but even when they ache, you must carry them with you because they will teach you. You were always bigger than this place, than the cage our people tried to confine you too, your soul burns too brightly. A product of my transgressions and a blessing I didn't deserve, oh, how I love you, my daughter. Never forget that.”    
  


Kusari was trying to collect her memories again, trying to escape the bittersweet pangs of her mother’s love. It was more than that, something was trying to draw her away from the memories that had surfaced because of Hades’ words and it was a power much stronger than she could fight. It used her mother’s voice, had her mother’s face, but its embrace was cold as the dawn light that began to break on the horizon. Kusari’s trembling finally ceased as she let her memories be infolded in that power, feeling numb and wrung out. She fought the weariness in her bones but was losing the fight as her eyelids grew heavy.

  
Her Mother’s voice continued as she drifted further away from the waking world, unable to distinguish the sudden shift when the echo translated for her  **_{Remember, We are of this star, aspected to it's every nature and when the time comes, it always takes back its own. Your soul is so resilient and strong, but you’re not ready to remember everything, my child, this is for the best.}_ **   
  
When she woke next to the windowsill because of a knock on the door sometime later, she would no longer feel as if she was forgetting something important. She would remember the Ancients, Hades, and the vow she made to remember what they had done and why, but the river of memories he had unsealed was dammed again. Mother had ensured it. 


End file.
